Centuries ago, Ugandan warriors would chew coffee beans before going into battle so they could feel strong and invincible. Today Ugandans look to coffee’s potency again, this time to strengthen their economy by increasing production of the world’s most sought-after commodity next to oil.
“Coffee, coffee, coffee... it has a strong tradition and culture in Uganda,” says Henry Ngabirano, Managing Director of the
Uganda Coffee Development Authority. “While tourists come to Uganda for different reasons, every tourist every day might invariably use coffee.”
As the head of the governing body responsible for the promotion and marketing of coffee production in Uganda, Mr. Ngabirano is proud of his country’s number one export crop, while also being keenly aware of the challenges that go with it.
When African leaders meet for a three-day summit in Washington D.C. next month, Mr. Ngabirano hopes one of the items on the presidential agenda will be coffee production.
“It would be great if their discussions could include improving farmer coffee incomes,” he says. “The global coffee industry is rightly demanding more and more sustainable coffee production systems, including environmentally friendly standards, which are not affordable for small-scale farmers because they don’t earn enough from coffee to meet those standards. The government must support them particularly in the area of water and soil management.”
Uganda is Africa’s second-biggest coffee producer after Ethiopia and eighth largest coffee producer in the world, and the world’s fourth largest Robusta producer.
The variety of wild Robusta coffees growing in Uganda’s rainforests are thought to be some of the rarest examples of naturally occurring coffee trees anywhere in the world. It is a birthright that Mr. Ngabirano hopes to capitalize on.
“In the last few years, Uganda has been at the forefront in the Robusta differentiation process, and I am glad that the consumers are now agreeable to the idea of differentiated Robusta,” he says.
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